The (Mis)Use of Kiswahili in Western popular culture

October 10, 2014 — That Kiswahili words and phrases sometimes crop up in western pop culture is not surprising; it is, after all, the most widely spoken African language on the continent. But every so often its use leaves native speakers a little puzzled.

Michael Jackson was made a prince of the Anyi people 1992 in Krinjabo, Cote d’Ivoire, in 1992, but his relationship with the continent began long before that. His use of Kiswahili in a song called “Liberian Girl” was a little odd though.

Kiswahili is a language spoken by more than 100 million people, predominantly in several states of East Africa. The language also has a significant presence in major cities of Europe, the United States of America and the Gulf states where African Diaspora communities are found. As a result of its global reach and millions of speakers the language pervades the lives of many across the globe and is never far away, even if not realised. For example it is taught in several universities around the world, and many media stations such as the BBC, Voice of America, Radio Deutsche Welle, Radio Moscow International and Radio Japan International all have programmes in Kiswahili.
In the United States the African American holiday Kwanzaa takes it names from the Kiswahili phrase ‘matunda ya kwanza’ meaning ‘the first fruits of the harvest’; ‘kwanza’ is the Kiswahili word for first. If you’re English, American or Canadian you may have also found yourself shouting out a Kiswahili word when playing the popular wooden block game Jenga; Jenga being the Kiswahili root word for build. In western popular culture Kiswahili has found itself in film, television and music. Sometimes its been used in short snippets, while other times complete monologues of characters have been in Kiswahili. However while its use is apparent the correct use of the language has not always been so.Hakuna Matata
Disney’s 1994 animated feature The Lion King is perhaps the most popular western film featuring Kiswahili. The film tells the story of a lion cub and future king named Simba. The film is full of Kiswahili words and phrases. The main character ‘Simba’ means lion (in Shona it means strength or power) and the friendly Baboon called Rafiki means friend. There are also many songs in kiswahiki in the film. One of which is when Rafiki sings to Simba ‘Asante sana squash banana, Wewe nugu mimi hapana’, which is Kiswahili for ‘Thank you very much, squash banana, you’re a baboon and I’m not.’

I can’t resist looking at the colorful pictures of King Sunny Ade and his many wives , not only because the pictures are fascinating and entertaining, but also because they remind me of my late father, Joseph Agbola Fagbola who had 6 wives and 10 concubines. That was the vogue up till the late 1950s and even early 1960s. It was a way of measuring success, and a life well-spent. Ijesa people will refer to a man with so many wives as ‘ALAYA REKETE’ (REPETE). This has only become inelegant in the face of improved healthcare with reduced infant mortality rate, as well as our stagnant economy with its attendant human misery of galloping inflation, skyrocketing unemployment, moral decadence and spiritual withering. But with people like Sunny Ade who is in the showmanship business, lewd and lascivious, as well as hedonistic living are all part of the trade mark of that type of occupation. An eloquent testimony to this could be found in the high velocity of divorce rate in Hollywood and Nollywood. The rate of divorce in those places is vivid in the thrilling and exciting novels of Jackie Collins, such as HOLLYWOOD DIVORCES, HOLLYWOOD WIVES-The New Generation Lethal Seduction, etc

I believe the pictures have not shown all ladies with whom Sunny Ads has relationship. Of course reference is made to all the ladies paraded here as official ones. It is like making reference to late Simbiat, late Kudirat, Bisi and Doyin as official wives of late business-mogul and ace politician, M K O Abiola. There are hundreds of other ones bearing his name today. I happen to know that the first wife of Sunny Ade, Abike (knee Akeredolu-Ale), is not shown in the pictures under reference. She and 3 of her brothers-Prof Ekundayo, Tunji, and Yomi-were my schoolmates at the Bishop Oluwole Memorial School (BOMS), Agege in the early 1950s.

Sunny Ade has not disclosed the number of his kids. This is either because the number is explosive and mind-boggling or because in Yoruba tradition ‘a ki i is omo f’olomo’ meaning we are forbidden from counting the number of children

Photos: Meet King Sunny Ade’s 7 ‘Official’ Wives

Not many know that Nigerian musician, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and pioneer of modern world music, King Sunny Ade has about seven ‘official’ wives.

The 68-year-old Osogbo born musician who can be classed as one of the most influential musicians of all time recently made it known that he doesn’t even know how many children he has but has decided to stop having them. This is evident, because all these ‘official’ wives have children for the Ondo-state royal blood.

With insinuations that he has other wives who can be referred to as ‘unofficial’, the internationally relevant musician whose real names are Sunday Adeniyi can be said to still be in the age-long culture of polygamy.

King Sunny Ade’s musical sound has evolved from the early days. His career began with Moses Olaiya’s Federal Rhythm Dandies, a highlife band. He left to form a new band, The Green Spots, in 1967. Over the years, for various reasons ranging from changes in his music to business concerns, Sunny Adé’s band changed its name several times, first to African Beats and then to Golden Mercury.

He has worked with foreign music stars and has gained an unquestionable ground internationally. Here are photos of the ace musician’s seven ‘official’ wives:

Meanwhile, at the beginning of another round of tour of the United States and Canada, Sunny Adé was appointed a visiting professor of music at the Obafemi Awolowo University Ile-Ife. In July the same year King Sunny Adé was inducted into the Afropop Hall of Fame, at the Brooklyn African Festival in the United States. He dedicated the award to the recently deceased Michael Jackson.

Recently, I had the pleasure of traveling to Ghana for 10 days to explore the history and culture of the region. And contrary to America’s heightened fear that traveling to West Africa would give me Ebola, I am fortunate to reassure you that I am happy and healthy.

Now that your potential conditioned hysteria is reduced, here is something you should be concerned about:

Black America, we have so much to actually learn about Africa — and yes, it does matter.

For far too long, our perceptions have been negatively impacted by white dominated narratives that have plagued our grade school text books and public discourse about the Motherland. The separation between our people across the diaspora is not just geographic, but philosophic. And while both sides can assess blame on boasting superiority against the other — Black America’s constant dismissal of the continent in our identity makes us the bigger culprit.

I, too, was once guilty of this — but sometimes it takes one to go back and re-direct the masses. Consider this my form of “Sankofa.”

These were my five major takeaways during what has now become my restored relationship to the ancestral homeland:

1) Privilege is real.

During my stay in Ghana, for the first time in my life I felt what it was like to be in the majority. Most of the population is black and the experience of seeing my skin color on nearly every television station, public arena, and facet of society gave me a psychological gratification and confidence. A sense of pride that allowed me to walk in the street without feeling targeted. A level of high self-esteem when I told people my professional aspirations and was sincerely heard and not interrogated. My time in Africa gave me a first-hand look at what it feels like to not be a second-class citizen in society. It showed me how much America has tried to ignore the existence of white privilege when it is actually engrained. On a lighter note, please don’t believe American companies when they say they cannot produce quality black television commercials and programs… I saw tons that would put ours to shame.

2) Understanding slavery in the past explains the current struggles of today.

“Get over it,” they tell us back home in the United States. There is absolutely no way we can and should when it paints a larger picture of the current systematic obstructions that are relevant to our present. In Africa, slavery is discussed and they actually have renowned museums and tourist attractions that cater specifically to the topic… I’m still waiting America. When visiting the former Elmina slave castles near the coast of Ghana, I felt a sudden sense of immediate anger, emotion, and frustration in how much of the manipulation and strategic disenfranchisements blacks faced then are still prevalent. Same crap, just a different day.

3)Sorry, Raven-Symoné — but we are indeed African-Americans.

Just because you cannot find your exact roots on a continent, doesn’t mean they aren’t apart of your ethnic make-up. That would be just as dumb as assuming that not knowing your father means you weren’t conceived by one. Coming to the realization of what it means to be an African-American rather than simply “American” gives me a more honest rationale as to why I face the current obstacles in a nation that speaks of “equality and justice for all.” Furthermore, it re-teaches me that my legacy didn’t start when my ancestors entered the West from slave ships (that’s only the second half of my identity), but that there was an enriched culture before America — and that was in Africa.

4) Oppression of black people is an international concern.

Just as we fight for justice in Ferguson here in America, our brothers and sisters across the Atlantic are dealing with the discrimination and mistreatment of mass hysteria related to Ebola. Across the diaspora, blacks are feeling ostracized from the global discourse of how to protect their own communities. Such lack of representation of Africans being able to address how to eradicate their own problems reflects a worldwide stigma of having black leadership. Although our issues at surface level are distinct, fundamentally we are tackling the same mission: making black lives matter.

5) There needs to be more cross-continental discourse of connecting blacks across the diaspora.

Enough with just having cultural food and music fairs… let’s have a discussion about universally helping one another socially. When I attended college, it often aggravated me how black Americans felt Africans were another foreign group of people they could not identify with. And it was also troubling to see some native Africans look down on blacks in the country for not feeling as self-confident and culturally strong about their heritage. At this very moment in our present history, we now more than ever need to put down our media-driven stereotypes about one another and have real conversations about it. I am tired of seeing too many people of color help one another among regional affiliations and not the diaspora as a whole. Because the truth of the matter is that the rest of the world do not see us any differently and by strengthening our connections we can better combat these problems.

In closing, my travels to the continent gave me a fresh perspective on how I relate to blacks across the diaspora and how their burdens shape my work here in America. A lot of what the black community is trying to look for in themselves in our media, education, and economy can be found in the legacy and teachings that come from our brothers and sisters across the Atlantic.

This is not to say that I am entirely dismissive of American values and opportunities, I have been privileged on a technological and industrial level. However, I do believe that now is the time to expect more than just survival, and begin to thrive.

It is going to take more than just a village… but an entire continental shift in unifying self-value for all people of color.

K. B. K. shared Zax Buzz’s album: New Brunswick Area NAACP 41st Annual Freedom Fund Luncheon.
“It’s one thing to read about the “four little girls” who lost their lives in the Birmingham AL bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in 1963, but to share a table with the “fifth” girl whom many of us have never heard of, and only survivor of that horrible act was truly humbling. To hear Sarah Collins Rudolph tell her story and her transformation showed what determination and faith can do. Once again, thank you Sarah Collins Rudolph!”

Flickr Photos

OUR BLACK STANDARD OF BEAUTY!

BLACK-SKINNED WOMEN: QUEEN MOTHERS OF THE BLACK RACE AND ALL BEAUTY!
Why do I sing Praises of your Beautiful, Black, ebony,velvet skin,”Blacker than the sky at midnight”{1},your full mushroomed mouth, your beautiful broad nose, your generous “Congo hips” {2}and full-flowered backside? Because for too long many of the Black Race have abused, dishonored you, degraded and denied you your crown, Queen of Queens,Queen Mother of the Black Race, Black Beauty Supreme! From you all the beauty of the Black Race springs forth.In fact all the world’s beauty springs from you,Mother of all beauty of all the races of the world! Your Black midnight,licorice,dark black chocolate,beauty, is Blackness concentrated in your beautiful “Black-blueberry”{3} face!
First in the order of creation is always given respect by Afrikan tradition. The 1st wife, the 1st elder, the 1st kingdom, the 1st original inhabitants, of the earth-all are considered with honor. So it should be with Black Beauty-our darkest -skinned Sisters are the 1st Mothers of the Universe-Black as a color came before all the many tones of brown,red,yellow and white. But for too long our Dark-skinned Queens have not been given the respect and place of honor they deserve. IN FACT THE WHITE BOY HAS INTIATED the cycle of reversing the true order of things by turning upside down the pyramid of Beauty, and placing white-light on top and relegating the most beautiful Black-skinned Beauties to rock bottom!
So Black people have been taught well how to deny our most
beautiful one her crown, taught how to reject our Blackest, most Afrikan features, full lips and nose and mouth and woollest hair, for the weaker characteristics of the white race. Shame on Black people! When will we wake up to this Black Beauty concentrated, from whence all our lesser beauty comes. When will we give the crown of crowns,the throne of thrones, to the Blackest Queen of Queens?
Most of us who suffer from”mulatto-mentality” and “yellow fever”, as Fela, our great Nigerian Musician calls it, will go on and on about what about us lighter queens-aren’t we/they beautiful too, yet you/we should be aware that such queens have gotten all the play in the past and that even in Black Egypt one of the reasons for its downfall was the allowing the lighter ones of the race, to place themselves above the rest of us in the name of lightness and pride of light-closer/to/whiteness. So if we’re yellow,to light brown/red, then we should give respect where respect is due and not live off of the artificial white thrill of having “white features” as if it is an advantage. Where would you be without your BLACKEST great Grandmother? We should honor the Blackest part of ourselves, thus giving us true pride of Blackness, not verbal signifyin’ but real testifyin’ that BLACK is beautiful! If the Blackest, most Afrikan-featured Sister isn’t respected as the Supreme Beauty of the Race,the Black woman’s beauty is not really respected at all for what it really is(only in terms of how closer to white we look). We all reflect the strengths of this concentrated beauty in ourselves, all the manifestations of how Blackness can present itself are seen in our faces. Down to the milk-lightest of us, our Blackness is what dominates us whether physically or mentally. But the Mother is greater than the child and so the Blackest is greater than all the other tones of the Black Race. If we don’t respect our Blackest Queen, we don’t respect our True Black selves. We must have a Black value for BLACKNESS in features and skin tone. We must have a Black Standard of Beauty based on the Black-skinned woman. ALL PRAISES DUE TO OUR BLACK-SKINNED QUEEN-MOTHERS!
Sister Yeye Akilimali Funua Olade
1981,Lagos,Nigeria
BLACK NOTES: Let me give tribute to Brother Damu,House of Umoja(San Francisco) for{1}
{2}Brother O.O. Gabugan in the poem “Black Queen For a Day”,{3}Sister Sonia Sanchez in her poem “,Queens of the Universe”,for the quoted words used in the first part of this article.

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GABOUREY SIDIBE IS A BIG BLACK SKINNED BEAUTY WHO HAS BROKEN THE IMITATION WHITE GIRL GLASS STANDARD OF BEAUTY!